"I _am_ so glad!" she said sincerely. "I don't believe anything nicer could have happened, even if we _weren't_ notified!" She put one arm around Joy, giving the unoccupied other hand to John Hewitt. "And I think it's specially nice of you to stay with me instead of with Mrs. Hewitt, my dear." Joy looked up at Hewitt appealingly. She was already beginning to feel that he was to be depended on to see her through things. "I think Mother will want her innings sooner or later," he said. "But we haven't really told either of you all about it. You shall have the whole thrilling tale in the train. Suspend judgment on us both till then, please." "Oh, there isn't any judgment," Phyllis answered gaily. "You needn't try to get out of your engagement on our account, either of you. The Harrington family registers entire satisfaction, doesn't it, Allan?" "We're both awfully glad, old man," said Allan for his part. Joy wondered, her heart beating with excitement, if they would mind very much when they heard the truth.... But such kind people as the Harringtons couldn't be very angry! She was beginning to feel irrevocably engaged.... Never mind--John Hewitt would see her through. She looked up at him, and he smiled down on her. "Let's all have dinner sent over here," suggested Phyllis brilliantly, "to celebrate. We'll have Viola go over to the hotel for your grandparents." But Grandfather, it appeared, had gone to bed to rest from his excitement, and Grandmother, of course, was staying with him. So the four of them ate together in the little green living-room of the bungalow, talking and laughing happily. Joy, between Allan and John, spoke very little. But she felt so contented and so in the midst of things that she did not need to talk. She gleamed and shone like a jewel or a flower, smiling and answering happily when she was addressed: and John, looking at her, felt that his four days' protectorate was going to be perfectly simple and easy to endure. CHAPTER FIVE THE SHADOW OF GAIL Joy spent most of the next morning talking to her grandparents--at least, they talked and she listened. Grandmother, now that the first shock was over, took the news with the same sweet and patient acceptance of people's behavior that forty-five years' sojourn among poets had taught her. The fact that Edith and Grace Carpenter were John Hewitt's aunt and mother appeared to comfort her a great deal. It made her feel less that Joy was marrying into a strange tribe. Joy was pleased that this gave her grandmother relief. It was not till the day of departure that she discovered what awful thing more had been the result of the friendship. Indeed, it could have occurred to nobody, although, as John and she agreed afterwards, anybody _should_ have seen what was going to happen!